RUSH: I’ll tell you how bad it’s getting at the border. Grab audio sound bite number 20. Last night on CNN Wolf Blitzer, one of his heroes was on as a guest, the New York Times foreign affairs columnist Tom “Loopy” Friedman. Friedman wrote a column recently where he called for a wall along the border with Mexico. Tom Friedman.

Friedman is the guy, Thomas “Loopy” Friedman, Friedman is the guy who thinks ChiComs do it right. That any country as large as the United States cannot function democratically. You need a small but very smart, elite group who can speed up decision-making for, of course, the common good. And the ChiComs are his living, breathing example of this.

So he is citing communism as a way of solving the problem. He doesn’t use the word, but, anyway, he hates Trump, he despises Trump, he’s like every one of these people from the liberal order. They’re just repulsed by Trump. But he took a trip to the border, and he was appalled by what he saw.

You know, it’s one thing to read about caravans, and it’s one thing to read the Drive-By Media talk about caravans not being that big a deal or that the people in the caravans, “We need to let them in because they’re so hungry and thirsty and they’re starving and they’ve walked for so long and they just want a better life and who the hell are we to say no. We’re no better than they are. They’re better than we are.” Easy to do all that.

Friedman went down there, was appalled by what he saw. He essentially saw an invasion. So Wolf Blitzer can’t believe it. This is like a gigantic sellout. For a foreign affairs columnist of the New York Times that loves the ChiComs to be saying that he agrees with Trump on something about immigration, Wolf Blitzer didn’t know what to do. He was looking for the bottle of Cutty Sark underneath the countertop. He said, “You want a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border? You want a wall with a smart gate?”

FRIEDMAN: I’m as radically pro-immigration as they come. But it’s pretty clear to me that unless we can assure a significant number of Americans that we can control our border, we’re never gonna have the proper immigration flow I think we need, we desire. And that we have actually a moral responsibility, given our history as a nation of immigrants and a refuge for people fleeing persecution. I think the only way is a compromise.

RUSH: Holy smoke. How do you compromise? How in the world do you compromise with people who are not wanting to do anything to stop the flow? Anyway, this is a striking admission. And Wolf Blitzer — and none of these other people on the left can believe it, either. Here’s Wolf Blitzer — well, he says it in the bite so you can hear it.

BLITZER: You say, though, you want a high wall with a big gate.

FRIEDMAN: Yes.

BLITZER: A smart gate. But a high wall, that’s gonna sound to a lot of folks out there that’s what Donald Trump wants.

FRIEDMAN: Well, I think you gotta control the border.

RUSH: (imitating Blitzer) “That’s what Trump wants. We can’t do this. That’s what Trump wants. Smart gate? Smart gate?” We need a high wall with a big gate, Friedman says, yeah, smart gate, smart gate, but a high wall. Smart gate? You mean like a smartphone? Not only is the idea sounding Trumpian, the language is sounding Trump. Yeah, we’re gonna have the biggest wall, we’re gonna have the smartest wall that anybody’s ever had. They can’t believe it.

Here’s the thing though. Friedman’s right. He is exactly right about this. Now, whether there’s some long-term trick going on here, I don’t know. And it could well be that this happens to be… I don’t believe things happen in a vacuum, and I don’t believe in coincidence. Meaning, I don’t believe that one day Thomas Friedman decided that we need a wall just because he thinks we need a wall.

I think these people — some of them on the left — are trying to find ways to take away Trump’s strengths. Trump has many strengths, and most of them are positions that are entirely, completely unique from the left. The left is so opposed to anything oriented around making America great again.

Do you realize that slogan alone drives them crazy? Who in the world in their right mind could be against making America great, whether you say “again” afterwards or not? Who can be opposed? But they are. They are opposed to it because Trump is for it. They are opposed to a wall because Trump is for it. Because they’ve all voted for a wall in the past. They’ve all advocated for a wall in the past, and many of them have voted to authorize funding from a wall, but now that Trump wants it? Ain’t no way, Jose. Ain’t happening.

They are not going to allow Trump to have a single victory if they can do anything about it, peen if it makes sense. It wouldn’t be good for their party. Now here comes Friedman, out of nowhere in his New York Times column, talking about the need for a wall. I would be very, very worried. I’m not gonna sweep it aside and pretend it’s not real. But I think there’s got to be somewhere in the bowels of this party, this progressive movement… There has to be somebody in there with a brain — a political brain — that realizes Trump won because of policy.

Trump won because of attitude. Trump won because he is an outsider. Trump won because people are fed up with Washington, and wanting a wall and stopping illegal immigration, stopping this invasion, is nothing more than common sense. Somebody in this party has got to understand that they’ve gotta defang Trump somehow, and they just spent (What is it now? Let’s count the campaign) five years trying to bet Donald Trump on the bays that he is scum, that he is a reprobate, that he’s unfit, that he’s a traitor, that he is a Russian spy or agent.

That he’s uncouth, that he’s a barbarian, that he’s a creep, that he’s a danger. And none of that has worked. They have not been able to convince Trump voters to abandon Trump with any of that. So, could this be — and I may be making way too much of this too. But could this be a trial balloon, say, to see if this could be something that could take a key weapon out of Trump’s arsenal? If the Democrats start talking about the need for a wall but don’t authorize it while Trump is president, if they start suggesting that they now understand the need for a wall…

And Thomas “Loopy” Friedman gives them the opening, because they idolize the New York Times; they idolize Friedman. I mean, all these Democrat politicians, these people on the left, everybody in the newsroom, if Friedman says it, they believe it. So if this is an opening salvo to allow other Democrats, “Yeah, I agree with Friedman.” Not “I agree with Trump.” “I agree with Friedman. We need to do something. But Trump’s not the guy to do it because Trump is scum. Trump’s a reprobate. Trump’s a character. Trump’s a scalawag. Trump’s whatever. But Friedman? Friedman is brilliant. Why, Thomas Friedman, he’s the epitome of what everybody should want to be,” all that riffraff.

So keep a sharp eye on this.